Message In A BottlePeople who’ve traveled far out there, alone and afraid, hungry and beaten down in the emptiness and desolation that is all that remains of what we used to be, often come across our little hamlet here and are astounded at our endurance, our fortitude.  More than once, we’ve been asked by wild-eyed, half-crazed, road weary ( Read more... )

Patient Zero

The itching has become nearly unbearable.   There isn’t a patch of the entire epidermis that isn’t raw and tingling.  Three days ago I could not have guessed that it might be possible for even hair to feel prickly and irritated.  I can almost imagine millions of microscopic fire ants crawling just under the skin.  It burns. Can’t let ( Read more... )

Inalienable Rights

Smothered by solitude, suffocating on stillness in the surrounding silence, his disquieted mind drifted back to the bygone era that was the dawn of the last millennium.  He’d only been a boy then, and could hardly remember what life had been like.  Not quite four decades had passed since the turn of the century, and how quickly it ( Read more... )